ADAM

Title:
Adam: International Review. 

Date of Publication: 
Founded in 1929 in Bucharest and published in London from September 1941–1995.

Place(s) of Publication:
Bucharest, Romania (1929-1941); London, England (1941-2, 1945-89)

Frequency of Publication: 
Irregular, but announced as monthly between 1941 – 42, and after a wartime interruption, 1945 – 66.  Quarterly from 1966 – 1995.

Circulation:
~1,000

Publisher: 
St. Clements Press, London NW 11; Emperor’s Gate, London SW 7

Physical Description: 
33 cm

Editor(s): 
Miron Grindea

Associate Editor(s):
None

Libraries with Original Issues: 
Bodleian Library; British Museum; Cambridge University Library; King’s College London; National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh; Trinity College Library; University of London Library

Reprint Editions: 
None

Adam – acronymic for Arts, Drama, Architecture, and Music – was an international review published in English and French. The original periodical began in Bucharest in 1929. In 1938 the magazine fell into the hands of editor Miron Grindea, who published the first London edition in 1941. The review had many famous contributors, including Pablo Picasso, Tristan Tzara, Jean Cocteau, and E.M. Forster.

Adam published pieces ranging from poetry to manuscripts to letters, such as the unpublished childhood memoir reproductions of Virginia Woolf’s early attempts at writing. The magazine also had issues devoted to individual artists, such as Baudelaire, Dickens, Beethoven, and Chopin. Adam published several contributions in French, including Grindea’s editorial introduction to the Graham Green tribute titled: “A la Recherche de Graham Greene.” The review regularly had about 1000 subscribers, and published its last issue in 1994 – over 50 years after its first English number.

Adam was one of the longest running little magazines: Alvin Sullivan attributes Adam’s longevity to the magazine’s “diversity of material”; Cyril Connolly who claims he knew “of only three magazines which survive unaltered from the ‘thirties: Partisan Review, The Wine and Food Quarterly and Miron Grindea’s indestructible Adam” (qtd. in “Adam” 4). In the 200^th issue of Adam, Miron Grindea quoted T. S. Eliot’s commentary on The Criterion from July 1938 in his own defense of the little magazine: “so far as culture depends upon periodicals, it depends upon periodicals which exist as a means of communication between cultivated people, and not as a commercial enterprise: it depends upon periodicals which do not make profit” (qtd. in “Adam” 5).

Adam did not publish a manifesto, perhaps because its editor, Miron Grindea, wanted to let its content speak for itself. The periodical did have a consistent devotion to offering a diversity of works, serving as an outlet for international artistic conversation, and forfeiting commercial popularity for the deliverance of high quality avant-garde art and writing.

Miron Grindea (Jan. 31, 1909 – Nov. 18, 1995)
Editor: 1941 – 1995

Miron Grindea, the editor of Adam, frequented avant-garde circles in pre-World War II Paris. He moved to Britain in September of 1939, the month that World War II was declared. He was married to the pianist Carola Grindea, and the couple had friendships with prominent artists such as Eugene Ionesco and Jean Cocteau. Thanks to Grindea’s relationships with celebrity artists, Adam was able to publish the works of writers like T.S. Eliot. When he died, he was working on the 500th edition of the magazine.

Nicholas Bentley
Cover design (No. 400)

P. Bien
“A Hartley Biography”

T.S. Eliot  
“Reflections on the Unity of European Culture” (No. 158)
“The Amis of Poetic Drama” (No. 200)
“Rhapsody on a Windy Night”
“The Hollow Men”
“A Song for Simeon”

Bernard Kaps
Wrote a drama of Ezra Pound’s despair after his imprisonment in 1945

D. Day Lewis
“The Watching Post”

Charles Moncheur
Published French translations of T.S. Eliot poems, including:

Raymond Mortimer
Issue celebrating Beethoven’s centenary

Jeremy Reed
“The Ides of March”

Ronald Searle
Cover design (No. 200)